Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Open Thread - What have y'all been up to lately?

This is my second attempt today, so I'm less than cheerful that I lost my first attempt by closing out a window that closed out EVERYTHING after a final review of HTML, but I'm gonna just bite my lip and forge forward and attempt a repeat. [sigh] No. 2 sent me more pictures of the Chicago vacation from her phone, so those of you unfamiliar with Hostels, here's a photo of maybe 1/3 of the hostel kitchen in Chicago's HI downtown:
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That's me in the back making a cup of tea. I brought tea (and those little sugar bags offered by fast-food places) and No. 2 provided me with some raspberry tea, as well. Got so "into" tea, though (particularly in the evenings after long days) that I needed to spend $1.62 on a store-bought tea-bag my last day downtown. Lots of folks cooked lots of meals for lots of people in that hostel kitchen during the 5 days I was there. I was one of those folks. No. 2 sent TWO photos that I want to present here from Cloud Gate. Cloud Gate is basically a giant stainless steel "bean seed" sculpture set down in the AT&T Plaza. Here's the official propaganda: "Inspired by liquid mercury, the sculpture is among the largest of its kind in the world, measuring 66-feet long by 33 feet high. It sits on the AT&T Plaza..." The author has this to say about his goal: "What I wanted to do...is make something that would engage the Chicago skyline so that one will see the clouds kind of floating in, with those very tall buildings reflected in the work. And then, since it is in the form of a gate, the participant, the viewer, will be able to enter into this very deep chamber that does, in a way, the same thing to one's reflection as the exterior of the piece is doing to the reflection of the city around." - Anish Kapoor.
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It's kindof like a Salvador Dali painting at first, dontcha think? If you're unfamiliar with Dali's surrealistic paintings (some of which we saw during a tour of the Art Institute), Virtual Dali is a start.
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Here we are, to the right of the green shirt; see No. 2 with the camera to her eyes? See me in the same clothes I wore in the Hostel Kitchen photo above? No. 2 was on a frog quest during our trip; [maybe too much Sesame Street as a young child], so she wanted to attend a frog exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry (which she read about as our luggage thumped into the terminal at Midway). Did I mention that our flight was 45 minutes late in leaving DFW because the plane needed to "take a test run" first? LOL. Guy next to me on the flight was ALREADY afraid of flying without hearing THAT! So, No. 2 ended up parking at Midway because driving around and around got to be more expensive with gas prices as high as they are and then moved into the terminal to survey the propaganda on Chicago (one of which included a frog exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry). Long story short, we went to the Museum of Science and Industry (because there wasn't a bus coming to take us where we'd really wanted to go), but it was about an hour from closing, the free days in every museum in Chicago had been cancelled during August, 2006 (in an attempt to make everyone money during tourist season, I guess), the cost to enter was something like $18.00 each with the frog exhibit $5.00 on top of that, and I was just too damn cheap to spend something like $1.00/minute. But, we went to the acquarium the next day and No. 2 paid $46.00 for the two of us to see everything they offered. We got there as soon as they opened. She was so afraid that the cost would be too high for me that she had her money whipped out and in someone's hands before I even knew we'd reached the counter of entry. LOL. (I love you, Sweetie!). Anyway, she took many frog pictures at the Acquarium, including:
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In other news, Em had a great vacation in Chicago, as well, golfing with his son three days, attending the PGA one day, talking to his grand-daughters (now aged 9 and 12) 4 days or nights, and visiting with old friends 1 day. Back to our weekly habits, our Monday cinema choice this week was "Snakes on a Plane". It shoulda been a "made for the SFC movie, because those snakes growled and everything just like the stuff we usually watch on Saturday evenings." I kept wondering about where I'd seen the young woman with the dog on TV, but neither Em nor #1 could offer any help even though I'd said, "She plays a cop in uniform, doesn't play a big role in the series...". A little research this morning shows Rachel Blanchard as Kevin's partner on Seventh Heaven. Neither Em nor #1 watch that show. Just goes to show I'm not as crazy as I look, though. :-) I don't play golf and I don't WANT to play golf, but retired people need more "move around" stuff, so Em and I are considering the thought of tennis again as something we could do together that benefits us physically in the exercise department. I've gone so far as to find a place where we could play, but I haven't gone so far as to buy tennis balls. [I'm CHEAP; I need a SALE on tennis balls before I can buy some!]. Gonna get into some more "dead-tree" reading after discussing some things Silly-O has read lately. Gonna try and manage my time in ways to incorporate more "little bit of this and little bit of that" each day versus the "slide down the rabbit-hole" time management technique I use currently. The problem with this is that I really think that Marie Montessorri had the right idea. Her Philosophy for children. "Montessori believed that children learn what they are ready to learn, and that there may be considerable differences among children in what phase they might be going through and to what materials they might be receptive at any given time. Therefore, Montessori individualized her educational method. Children were free to work at their own pace and to choose what they would like to do and where they would like to do it without competition with others." <-- that's been my retirement goal, but I'm gonna expand it to include other activities that may/may not take me down rabbit-holes. That's it for me this week, I think; what's up with YOU?

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Chicago Photos and a VERY VERY Happy Birthday to No. 2!

25 years and lookin' cuter every day...
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This was taken at the Art Institute. I've been having some problems getting photos sized correctly AGAIN...so it will take a while to get what I'd hoped to include in this thread and some things I'd hoped to include just can't be included. [sigh!]
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I'm pretty sure No. 2 took this photo from the balcony of the Aquarium. She took them with her cellphone; not bad, IMO. Speaking of the Aquarium, here's a photo of a Leafy Seadragon. These were SO Kewl! They swim vertically, and if you didn't KNOW they were sea creatures, you'd think they were plants.
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Here's another one from the Art Institute. No. 2 was trying her hand at photographing my head inside some Native American headgear. I thought it came out pretty good.
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Spent one evening down at Navy Pier; that was fun. No. 2 caught the sunset behind the flags there:
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We had a lovely evening for a sail on Wednesday evening last week; didn't go sailing with son and Silly-O over the weekend; had other plans. J caught a nice photo of No. 2 captaining the sailboat: Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting
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Lastly, we ALL spent quite a bit of time in Millenium Park the past week. No. 2 took some pictures of us through the Cloud Gate, but she hasn't sent them to me. The Crown Fountain was a hit with us, though. It's fun because you're dressed when you run into it, IMO.
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Hope your B-Day was fun, No. 2! You sure provided ME with some laughs. Feel free to blog more photos from your phone. We're missing a whole lot of frog pictures, I think.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Hospitality at Davidson's Bar and Eatery.

No. 2 picked us up at the airport yesterday, dropped Em at his son's house, and took me back to where she lives. With all the delays, it got to be Noon and I was hungry (hadn't eaten anything yet all day). Cheapest place for us to eat out would be at Davidson's (because No. 2 gets a discount). We spent most of the afternoon at Davidson's meeting her friends and co-workers. After HOURS of talking, eating, and (of course) beer drinking, we took a little historical tour nearby. It was a great afternoon for a walk. Dinner plans were for (You guessed it)...Davidson's, where family and more friends would gather. Didn't make it much past 10pm, and had a full Davidson's day. Great people, great hospitality...sure made me feel welcome. They also comped almost all our expenses, so here's a BIG smooch for all those wonderful people...from the owners to the beautiful servers. SMOOOCH.......... This morning we're off to drop No. 2's car at Em's son's house to take the Elevated downtown. At least *I*'m shooting for this morning. No. 2 is a slow mover. Gonna get a big breakfast at McDonald's before we go, so we have energy until later in the afternoon. Once there, we'll drop off our bags (too early to check in) and check out any/all of the following activities: farmer's market, art institute, planetarium, Head of Femur concert. Head of Femur is an American rock band based in Chicago. They'll be performing at the Jay Pritzker Pavillion in Millenium Park. After dinner, we'll walk over to Butler Field in Grant Park for the 7th Annual Chicago Outdoor Film Festival. Bedtime will probably come pretty early again after such a long day with so many activities outdoors. This is SO exciting! Looks like she might be close to ready to leave, too!

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Open Thread; Whatcha'll been doin'?

You may have noticed that I turned off anonymous posting. Only takes one rotten apple (as someone once said) and someone came in anonymously recently who posted a hot link to (can't really remember) maybe an internet gambling site. Thing is, this blog doesn't exist so that folks can get free advertising and even maybe infect innocent people who click on their offerings. So, not wanting to be responsible for inspecting every anonymous post, I turned off the option. Bottom-line is that I'm short on time; even thought about just deleting the blog for lack of time. Been trip-planning and know what I'll be doing MOST days. I'll be spending some time the next few days making plans for the days I'd intentionally left open for various family members who just never got back to me. Got a funny Email from one uncle of mine who said the equivalent of "I'm happy to communicate with you via the internet, but I'm not so keen on you stopping by to see how we look these days." :-) Got an Email from someone I met in San Francisco who finally checked out the blog and considered herself one of the characters I'd mentioned. Heh. If the shoe fits, I suppose... My backyard garden has suffered tremendously from the extreme heat/drought that's been affecting the US, not to mention insect damage. I'd take a few pictures of the plight, but my monitor has again (after two years or so of being fine) moved into magnetized mode, so I can't see pictures without massive distortion. This malady is unexplainable and disappears as quickly as it appears...when it's good and ready. Last time it lasted about 6 months. Still trying out new recipes. My experiment of the week is corning brisket. Did you know that corned beef was corned brisket? Who Knew? I'm not gonna smoke this piece of brisket after I corn it, but I will the point piece, and THAT will be pastrami. Looks like OTHER cuts of beef can be corned and corned/smoked, but brisket is the one I fell across first. MY recipe only requires 5-7 days of laying around in the salted spice mixture before slow cooking, so that's what's going on this week in my refrigerator. I don't even think I LIKE corned beef or pastrami, but Em does and I've really branched out in food experiments the past few years to include things I'd never thought I'd enjoy. #2 is the picky eater I was in my 20's...no onions, no peppers, no garlic; whatdya think I'm NUTS? Went to see Miami Vice at the cinema yesterday. Don't know the names of the actors, but the white guy, IMO, is a whole lot sexier than Don Johnson ever was, and the black guy isn't nearly as sexy as the guy with the three first names was. I thought it was a good-enough movie, though; what could go wrong with sex and violence? Gonna try and finish reading Angels and Demons before the weekend so I can return it to the library before we leave next Monday. It was due back today, but Em was able to renew it (only because no one else had put it on reserve). For some reason, I can spend HOURS in the AM reading about Hizbollah and other world news online, but sitting down with a dead-tree book puts me to sleep after only about one hour. So, what's new with y'all? How did you cope with the heat-waves that hit the world this year; what have you done for entertainment lately; what's up with you that's not up with ME? Spill!